What new collective bargaining agreement means to Phillies

IT IS OCT. 1, the final Saturday of Major League Baseball's regular season. The Phillies and Astros both clinched wild-card spots earlier in the week and are now destined for a one-game playoff in 4 days.

But with two games remaining, the site of that playoff game depends on what happens today and tomorrow. The Astros' rotation calls for aces Roger Clemens and Roy Oswalt to close out the regular season, while the Phillies have their two most productive starters ready to go. Houston leads by one game in the standings, which means today and tomorrow will decide which team hosts the playoff.

You are Charlie Manuel or Phil Garner. What do you do?

If you are Garner, do you choose to throw Clemens on Saturday in hopes of locking up homefield advantage, or do you save him for the playoff? If you are Manuel, do you give up on homefield advantage and get your pitching ready? Do you hold off on Brett Myers, who has the best shot at going toe-to-toe with Clemens or Oswalt? Do you rest Ugueth Urbina, who has pitched in four of the last five games?

In MLB's new playoff format, announced yesterday as part of the sport's new Collective Bargaining Agreement, both Manuel and Garner would have confronted the aforementioned situations during the final weekend of the 2005 season. Under the old system, they were fighting each other for a playoff spot, which led to some intense drama as both teams won their last two games of the season, landing the Astros in the postseason and the Phillies on the golf course. Opponents of the new system, which will start either in 2012 or in 2013, decry the potential loss of such late-season races. But the addition of a second wild-card team in each league, which raises the number of participants to five, will certainly create some interesting talk-show fodder.

The Phillies, in case you were wondering, would have qualified for the playoffs in 2005 and '06 under the new system. Today, they've reached a point where they expect to be there regardless of the number of teams who qualify. Still, the postseason format is the most interesting part of the new CBA.

The format would seem to reward a team like Manuel's 2011 squad, which led the majors with a 102-60 record. They likely would have been able to sit back and watch wild-card teams Atlanta and St. Louis engage in a one-game win-or-go-home battle. Would that have helped them beat the Cardinals? Would they have even played the Cardinals?

The old rules prevented division opponents from facing each other in the first round. That is no longer the case. If the Braves had won, they would have faced the Phillies in a five-game series despite having hosted them in a three-game series to end the regular season.

How much impact will this have?

The Phillies would have snapped their playoff drought in 2005, facing Houston in a one-game playoff to move on. In 2006, they would have faced the Dodgers in a one-game playoff as the second Wild Card.

Assuming the top seed gets to face the winner of the one-game playoff, the Phillies would have squared off against the Dodgers in the first round of the 2008 postseason, with the Brewers and Mets playing in a one-game playoff for the right to face the Cubs.

It remains to be seen whether the new format will be in place for 2012; the CBA sets a deadline of March 1 to decide whether it is instituted for the upcoming season.

Among the new components in the agreement, the revised playoff system and new testing for human growth hormone will have the most far-reaching effects. But there are several other areas that should be of interest.

First and foremost is the revised draft pick compensation for free agents, who no longer will be ranked according to a complex statistical formula (starting in 2012). For starters, the only players who will be subject to compensation are those who have been with their clubs the entire season, which could effect the strategy of some teams at the trade deadline. For example, the Giants would not be eligible to receive compensation for Carlos Beltran, whom they acquired at midseason. That might have made them think twice before dealing a top pitching prospect for a rent-a-player, since they would not receive anything in return if he departed via free agency. Under the old system, they would have received two early-round draft picks, including a potential first-rounder.

Furthermore, a team must offer a free agent a 1-year contract equal to the average salary of the 125 highest-paid players from the prior season, which in this year was north of $11 million. In other words, the Phillies would have to give a player like Oswalt the option of accepting a 1-year contract at that dollar figure in order to be eligible for compensation. If he accepted, the Phillies would be locked into that contract. If he declined, he would become a free agent and the Phillies would get draft-pick compensation if he signed elsewhere.

A club that signs a free agent who is subject to compensation will forfeit its first-round pick, unless that pick is in the Top 10, in which case it will forfeit its second-round pick. Additionally, the club who loses the free agent will get a pick in between the first and second rounds.

The Phillies will still be eligible to receive compensation for free-agent reliever Ryan Madson in a modified version of the old system that will govern this offseason. Assuming the Phillies offer Madson arbitration, which is a formality, they will get the pick in front of his new team's highest non-protected selection. In other words, the Phillies will still get the compensation they were expecting under the old deal, but that compensation will not come at the expense of that team. Compensation for Jimmy Rollins will remain as it would have been, with any potential suitors having to forfeit their top non-protected draft pick (assuming the Phillies offer their shortstop arbitration, which is likely).

Leaguewide, the biggest change lies in draft-pick spending, with teams being taxed on a sliding scale for every dollar they spend above their allotted scale. Under the old plan, the commissioner's office simply "recommended" the signing bonus for each pick, but the Phillies usually adhered pretty closely to those recommendations. Regardless, lower-revenue teams will be affected more, since the real cost of exceeding their pool will be greater than teams with higher amount of disposable income.

More significant from the Phillies' perspective is probably the threshold for the competitive balance tax, which will remain at $178 million in 2012 and '13. The Phillies' payroll finished the season right around that number, which increased yearly under the old plan. The tax rate for first-time offenders will decrease to 17.5 percent, but it will increase to 50 percent for clubs that exceed the threshold for a fourth time or more. Second-time offenders will continue to be charged a 30 percent tax on every dollar they spend above the threshold. Third-time offenders are taxed at a 40 percent rate. The threshold will increase to $189 million for 2014, '15 and '16.

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